It is Independence Day. The day that Americans celebrate throwing off the shackles of King George and declaring to the world that we have the God Given right, RIGHT, to decide our own fate, our own destiny and to not be governed by those that think themselves above the law.

The day we celebrate the fact, the FACT mind you, NOT the belief, that ALL MEN ARE CREATED EQUAL.

Pay attention to that word “created” for it plays a large role in how this country was born. All men are equal in the eyes of the law. Nature, however, has always taken quite a different approach to that whole equality thing. It boggles my mind that there is a group of people in this world that can hold beliefs that are directly contradictory to each other. Specifically the liberal stance that man should stay out of “nature” (i.e. everywhere we have not yet built over or paved) yet we cannot let nature takes its course in society and let people succeed or fail on their own merits, that it isn’t “fair” that some people have more than others, never mind that some people are naturally smarter, or more ambitious or luckier than others.

That ideal, that we must take from those that have, those that earn and give it to those that don’t have or earn is patently un-American, and at its heart an evil policy of theft, avarice, greed and sloth.

It is theft from those that produce, avarice on the part of those that create those laws and policies and greed and sloth on the part of those that don’t produce or earn what they receive.

It has been said that those that surrender liberty for security deserve neither.

Of course it has also been said that:

"A strict observance of the written laws is doubtless one of the high duties of a good citizen, but it is not the highest. The laws of necessity, of self-preservation, of saving our country when in danger, are of higher obligation. To lose our country by a scrupulous adherence to written law would be to lose the law itself, with life, liberty, property, and all those who are enjoying them with us; thus absurdly sacrificing the end to the means." --Thomas Jefferson to John Colvin, 1810.

And this wisdom:

Dependence begets subservience and venality, suffocates the germ of virtue, and prepares fit tools for the designs of ambition.And:

Force is the vital principle and immediate parent of despotism.

I put forth that what the democrats are now doing (and have been for years) is patently un-American.

They have created a class of dependent people who are subservient to them. There are generations of people on welfare that have been told repeatedly that they are owed something for the travails of their ancestors. They show their subservience by blindly following a party that strives to keep them poor and panders to their victim mentality and they sell themselves for a pittance like common whores instead of taking responsibility for their lives and working towards a better future for themselves and their country.

The democrats suffocate the germ of virtue, for there is true virtue is honest work, and no virtue in sloth. Now that the people are becoming more dependent the ambitious designs of the democrats coalesce and ever more theft is in the future of this country.

They use the force of law to threaten citizens with prison and more theft in the form of fines and penalties if we stand up to this theft and say no.

Despotism comes next.

So on this Independence Day we should sit back and reflect on what it means to BE an American.

Being an American means so much more than simply living in this country. Being an American is a state of mind. One might say that BEING an American is almost a religion. For a religion is not solely an adherence to some book or belief or non belief in a deity but rather the way one lives their life and the beliefs and actions that guide ones decisions.Secular Humanism is a religion. As is adherence to the junk science of global warming, but those are topics for another day and we shall stick to the point of what it takes to BE an American.

There are many people around the world that are Americans at heart, but may never make it to our shores. Conversely there are many people in our great country that do not deserve the title of American.

Americans crave freedom.

Freedom to live their lives as they see fit.

Americans desire Independence.

Independence from tyranny and oppression.

Americans realize that Liberty is the first gift of the Creator and we so love the concept that all men are created equal and have an inalienable right to live in freedom that we have consistently gone to war to secure that freedom for ourselves and others.

Being an American means also being generous, to a point. We have been blessed in this country by our forefathers that sacrificed to build a nation of free men, men that were free to choose their destiny and succeed on their own merits, talents and abilities and this blessing should be shared. But a handout is inherently evil, as opposed to a “:hand up,” and true Americans understand the grace involved in helping our fellow man to become a better person by teaching them to contribute to society, thus bettering all of us, rather than to suckle at the teat of thieving socialist policies.

I have long said that socialism destroys the human spirit. People are like pendulums, and I have found that, generally, as far over on the side of good they can swing they can also go that far on the side of evil. The kindest most generous people I have known have also been the most vindictive when angered. Look at the democrats. They are extremely kind with other peoples’ money and thoroughly evil when it comes to actually getting that money from them, short of actually stabbing them in the street and taking their wallet.

Life is a lot like a pendulum also.

A man that cannot truly fail; I mean end up in the gutter living under a bridge and eating from a trashcan due to socialist policies that guarantee a minimum standard of living is also a man that cannot find the greatest heights of success through his ability. For the system that takes away the possibility of utter and abject failure also must take away the ability to truly succeed simply to take care of those failures and pepper the lower rungs of society.

The death of the human spirit is the only possible outcome of socialism.

Witness France.

They refused to ratify their new EU constitution because it took away too much of their welfare state and now many of them are up in arms about Sarkozy and his seeming adherence to a more conservative approach (read more common sense and personal responsibility and fewer 35 hour work weeks) to governing his whiny and complacent countrymen.

That mindset, the belief in a system of socialism that steals from those that produce to give to those that do not is exactly one of the major reasons our country fought a revolution. Only instead of every citizen being the recipient of that theft it was used for the state only.

King George III got exactly what he deserved. An ass whipping of such epic proportions that 230 some odd years later it is still a sore point with the descendants of his country. Policies and laws that steal from one to give to another are inherently evil and should be completely against everything an American stands for, but many of our countrymen have gone soft, in the belly and the mind and hold beliefs that advocate exactly those ideals. Guilt and indoctrination from socialist academia and media have turned many of our countrymen, well — stupid.

Independence Day. The day we celebrate the founding of our great country and the ideals that make us uniquely American.

Daniel Webster gave the eulogies for Thomas Jefferson and John Adams (who both died on July 4th, 1826) and he said; "It [the Declaration of Independence] is my living sentiment, and by the blessing of God, it shall be my dying sentiment. Independence now, and independence forever."

This Independence Day reflect on the qualities that make us Americans and know that the forces arrayed against Liberty cannot win so long as we hold true to the principles that our country was founded upon.